The OFFICERs Bureau (Sterling x Jess Incognito)

[Sterling]

"It makes me feel like I never was, ... like I wouldn't be missed if I didn't exist."

A stillness crept over Frank as he sat with Liza upon the great, granite outcropping. His eyes darted to catch sight of their avian neighbors as they winged their way between the oak and hickory tree trunks with fluid grace. When the birds kept to their hidden perches, the scene reverted to a condition of perfect, yet resolute stillness. Leaves shifted and branches swayed in the light breeze that forced all denizens along a continuum of self-reflection. Nature could grip a person with such intensity, yet reveal nothing but instead surrender its measure—the emptiness of life itself, a nihilism of operational meaning toward those things deemed unnecessary and exigent. Perhaps that was what Nature did ... it opened the mind and soul to the existential void that surrounded everyone, and became a grand mirror to the Self.

Was that was Mr. Hendrickson witnessed here?

Frank struggled to connect the dots that danced about his peripheral vision like a constellation of conceptual barriers. What made a simple man like Mr. Hendrickson, someone who epitomized the comfort and prestige of the average citizenry, break from the very foundation of, not only society, but his own sanity. He was insane, wasn't he? Why else would he commit suicide? TELEstream pushes those lies like a hungry whore. Then what's the answer? They're whirling about you.

The birds.

Frank watched them look, flit, and scamper there and about along tree branches and the verdant spurge on the ground. There must have been many dozens of birds casting about, chirping their songs in a flurry of sharp tweets and mellow warbles. Their behavior was wild, but fancy-free; they needed no encouragement for a more efficient manner of being themselves. Frank pondered that fact for some moments before considering a cluster of stray twigs, woolen stuffing, and drinking straws in a high set branch. It was a bird's nest, and owing to the time of year, likely abandoned. As a boy, Frank remembered reading about the life-cycle of young birds; it was one of the reasons TELEstream selected him to pursue Mr. Hendrickson, given the quarry's predilection for birds. Liza's voice, soft and concerned in suggestion, interrupted his recollections. He turned to face her.

"Yes, Dear. We should be leaving. TELEstream will send agents in pursuit of us before long ... we should lose ourselves in the Dim Quarter and search for your parents." The rock face felt surprisingly smooth as Frank slid down and stood next to Liza. His eyes painted the distant nest with his own brand of intense scrutiny once more before leading Liza from the woods back to the car.

 

[Jess Incognito]

Liza stood by, wondering what it was that made Frank linger a second longer. The beauty of the GreenSpace, perhaps, but she believed something else lurked in his mind. She felt much of the past day she had been with him that he held private conversations in his head, thinking things out. These were things she neither knew nor could guess. A beast followed them, but where Frank could see details of its face with eyes closed, Liza saw only an outline in the shadows. TELEstream, its agents... she heard and would heed his warnings, but did not fully understand for what she need prepare.

She dipped her head and lowered herself into the seat of the hovercar. The GreenSpace flew past and fell away behind them. After that she looked to the way ahead. It made sense to search in the Dim Quarters. No one would pay any mind to a child missing there and she worried it was all too possible there were many. Only once they were well out of the GreenSpace did she direct her attention to her companion. Frank drove with his eyes glued to the way ahead - the only way she'd seen him drive. She wanted to ask if he really thought they would find her parents, if there was any chance in hell, but she cast that thought aside. It was something a little girl would ask. He wouldn't know any more than she. Starting when the front door of her family home slammed shut for the last time, she began trying to be someone else. It was a conscious effort and not for the last time she felt it was to no avail. Instead she chose silence.

Towering metallic figures in the city's center rose around the highway like giants prepared to trample their prey. They began scattering amidst squat industrial buildings, a sort of buffer zone between that which is favorable and that which is not. That which is not favorable stretched out beneath them now. A great valley containing the lowest point in the city, both geographically and in terms of economic prosperity. Liza had never set foot anywhere near this place. Not within her memory.

The highway sped over the Dim Quarter. It continued on its trajectory, unbent and unbroken. A piece of the slum had been bulldozed to make way for supports some years ago. Most citizens living elsewhere never wondered what happened to the people who lived in those homes. The highway stood a gleaming bridge over some dark abyss. Truly, if one crossing the expanse at night did not glance down at the faint lights in the windows of the shanties, they might never know it existed.

An exit ramp led them down to ground level before they even neared the bridge. They hadn't yet left the Industrial Sector, really, but there were no roads where a hovercar could go further into the valley where homes sat on homes sat on homes. Third stories leaned together with crooked alleyways running beneath. The foundations in the center of the valley used to be a housing project. A short concrete building, now stained by rust trailing from the stacks of structure built on top. It seemed at any moment that concrete might fail and unleash and avalanche of converted cargo containers, lumber and found materials. Liza looked over to Frank, "It can't be difficult to get lost in there," she commented, half worried it was possible they might not find their way out if they ventured too deep.

 

[Sterling]

The Dim Quarter.

Every society has an underbelly, a span of irrefutable evidence against the universal acclaim. The Dim Quarter existed, less as a conglomeration of hovels, as proof that the great culture enraptured by TELEstream was flawed and that certain citizens could be considered disposable. Frank knew the place well enough to jog his tired memory. He had visited the pressing squalor on numerous occasions while serving as an OFFICER in pursuit of some quarry. Most of the investigations Frank conducted were uneventful; one nearly ended his life. Gangs grew in the fertile void of assurance and prosperity, conducting the tribal business that all destitute factions seemed destined to profit. Kinship, desperation, and violence—these three realities coronate a tyranny that often oppresses the poor, and the Dim Quarter enjoyed neither waiver, nor respite.

The on-board computer activated for the first time since Frank tore TELEstream from his life and embraced the fate of a nomadic protector to the woman in the passenger seat. His companion, Liza, sought her parents—her real parents. Frank Harper was prepared to do everything in his power to grant Liza her wish. The only problem was the result of Frank's forced liberation—his private revolution. Disconnecting from TELEstream meant that the computer was denied access to the real-time location of the Dim Quarter's citizenry, who still retained their armbands for the meager services offered and the hollow temptation of a better life. That was the glorious lie—making people believe that, beyond all chances, they could still succeed, rejoin society, and share in the revenues of cultural prosperity.

The monitor plotted a map of their position, and Frank brought up the locations of Liza's mother and father. The impoverished often eschewed a fixed position, needing to migrate and wander about a territory in search of food or scraps to eek out an existence. The best tactic was to aggregate a year's worth of data relating to locations; thus, locating a subject in time and space became less an exercise in singular precision than understanding the accurate swath of recently visited locales. The map showed a cloud-like matrix of tiny, red dots for the father, and a single location for the mother.

Frank swiveled the monitor toward Liza and explained the situation. "There's strong evidence your mother is located here." Frank pointed at the red dot. "I suggest we travel there and see what we can find."

 

[Jess Incognito]

His fingers flew over the monitor, making contact here and there. Liza couldn't see any more than that until he turned it around for her. A small red dot. She glanced at Frank, lingering for a moment. A small, red dot; there it was. Her own, real mother. Along the top of the screen stood tall, thin letters. She repeated the name nearly inaudibly, "Bethany Carroll."

Frank's arm rested on the center console and Liza's fingers slid over them without a thought. Her hopes and anxieties together showed plainly in her eyes though they rested all the while on this small, red dot. Any fear of the Dim Quarter had been replaced by the singular motivation to find Bethany Carroll. How far from the mark she had begun, thinking of the week she had spent looking before Frank sat down in the simple, metal chair and waited for her. Perhaps her guess was born out of the subconscious belief that she couldn't possibly have been born in such a place. All thoughts of that just in this moment did not matter. Were it not for Frank, Liza would be stumbling around Nexopolis even now.

She squeezed the hand gently, springing back into motion. "I'm ready," she looked over to her companion. The sun hung high above the valley still, but not long and deep shadows would breed in every corner. She let her grasp on him slip away as she opened the door and stepped out. A path led into the area. At first the buildings were well spread apart, not enough for a yard and a fence, but each stood separate. The area after then grew small around them and homes stacked tall, leaning sometimes above them. A stream of people moved along with them, into the valley, but another moved out. One shift in the Industrial Sector ended and another began. A smell, not exactly a stench, but a thick air, hung about the place. The makeup of it changed as they moved along, passing different people and foods, but the smell was still the same.

She felt eyes on them. The Dim Quarters were not so humble to say everyone knew everyone, but everyone knew an intruder when they saw one. Curiosity piqued, because visitors did not happen in often and when they did, it was never good.

 

[Sterling]

Frank always forgot about the incessant density when traversing the Dim Quarter. Every aspect of the place assaulted the senses with a concentration that seemed designed to affront—the smells, the crowds, the tenements, the despair. Frank's sharp, hawk-like eyes cut through the morass of litter and abject squalor, searching for danger in constant vigilance. Though absorbed in a state of high-alert, the former OFFICER felt torn for the people around them. TELEstream deemed the residents of the Dim Quarter human, but not deserving of nominal rights and dignity; such a designation could not help but hamper the formation of something as fragile as self-identity. Regardless of their assigned handicaps, however, Frank knew the inherent dangers of entering the Quarter. He knew that he and Liza could easily become overwhelmed and trapped within a maze.

In the shadow of a defunct canopy, Frank reached his right hand into his coat and palmed his weapon. The device hung under Frank's left breast, in a sling-type holster made of mesh and black leather. The long, gray jacket Frank wore obscured the weapon from pedestrian view. When in a service predicated on enforcement and action, concealment of the weapons at ones disposal granted a definite tactical advantage. Frank felt even more aware of his surroundings, supremely suspicious of the milling throng about them. His left hand, free from duty, reached out and took Liza's, interlacing his fingers with hers. It was a gesture of practicality and concern; Frank wanted to lead confidently without milling about, and he also wished to comfort her while navigating the rougher areas. Taking Liza's had been a subconscious choice, and he surprised himself with his reluctance at the thought of letting go.

The crowd began to thin as the pair waded into a series of tight alleyways. The composition of the ground had degraded from compacted soil to a rust-colored sand, and each step kicked up tiny clouds in their wake. The path led to a tunnel-like connection, dark and mysterious its light on the other side. Frank produced his Prompter, not releasing Liza's hand for fear of losing her in the space. A dull, yellow light emanated from Frank's device and bathed the exterior corridor. Rat carcasses, in various states of decay, littered the unseen junction of ground and wall. A roughly cut, metal plate served as a door.

"This is the last known location where your mother should be." In the pale light, frank's eyes arched in worry. "Shall I accompany you or wait out here?"

 

[Jess Incognito]

Liza inhaled deep, feeling pressured by the crowd. More people than she had ever seen in one place milled about them in their every day fashion. With Frank pulling her along the way, she looked around every which way like a child in the back seat of a hovercar - aware for the first time that the vehicle did not make up the entirety of the world between home and destination. All of a sudden she felt herself sucked into a crevice of an alleyway. The sounds and smell of the pushing crowd could not follow the pair here into the dusty corridor. Breath left her slowly when finally Frank chose a door.

Liza looked at Frank and then the door and back at Frank. She was unsure. Not that this was her mother's door. Not that Frank was correct. She was unsure how she wanted to feel. What she wanted to get out of this reunion.

"Come with me," she said barely above a whisper. The coolness of the space seemed to demand it.

She raised her hand to the unfinished metal and knocked. Liza couldn't have known this door was rarely knocked upon. Any visitors knew to simply go in and were welcome to do so. No others ever visited. And so the heavy knock upon the door first brought about some confusion. Resident children every age from four to twelve looked around at one another and the short walls within for source or answer. Liza's knocks echoed far between; she hesitated each time, but the next came steadily, muffled though it was by the strange and crowded shanty home.

The door swung open on the fourth knock, for which she had listened an extra minute. A small girl with dirty, but well pleated brown hair looked up at the two with her fist clenched on her hip.

"Who're you?"

Liza wasted a beat looking at this small thing. She hadn't accounted for other children. "We're looking for Bethany Carroll."

"An' what you gonna do with Auntie Beth?" The girl asked cheekily.

"I just want to talk," Liza said, lowering her head in a manner that showed her truth. The girl eyed Frank hesitantly; there was something intuitive she knew about his like. After a few calm breaths, the girl pushed open the door, heavy against her small arms, and ran further inside. Her permission to enter. Liza caught the door before it slammed shut on them once more and ducked her head to follow the girl.

They followed this girl's every step through the disheveled, overpopulated home. Home it clearly was, though none Liza knew, for everything was well used and looked much loved. Other children looked up curiously at them and stared without wondering if it was rude. They reached a back room in which two women cooked. To say it was a kitchen would be inaccurate. A peculiar little stove was surrounded by the only clear wall space, its exhaust stretching up and through an opening cut from the wall. The girl whispered something into the skinnier woman's lowered ear and was rushed out with a sharp pat on the butt. The woman stood straighter and eyed her visitors.

"I'm Beth Carroll. What d'you need?" Her gaze hung on them, perhaps it would be fierce but for the apparent exhaustion in the skin hanging around her eyes. They were Liza's eyes. She didn't realize, but they were. A deep blue-green with a shock of hazel round the pupil, only her eyes were younger and Beth Carroll's faded with age.

"You had a child once who was taken," Liza started shaky with hope, "And they named her Eliza, but I don't think that's what you called her. I have the paperwork-" Her arm was in her small bag up almost to the elbow, but there wasn't any paper there. She had left the document crumpled on the floor of the apartment where Frank first stopped her.

"No one never took a child of mine," Beth Carroll said with a sudden shot of electricity, "Let's be clear." Her arms rested one over the other over her breasts and she stared at Liza and Frank as if they had suggested something very wrong and very inaccurate. Liza looked to Frank for support. She felt overwhelmed at the quickness and downhill nature of this conversation.

Liza stuttered to start, "I think I'm that girl and that you're my m-"

"I don't know what you're pushing, but I think you should leave." She looked suddenly very angry, "GET OUT!"

Her heart raced painfully now and her face showed it, contorted with emotional and physical stress. "I just want to talk." As Liza said this Beth Carroll walked around the small table and was rushing towards them with what intent Liza didn't care to find out. Suddenly a great beast, towering above her with fangs instead of incisors. Beth Carroll Liza turned and pushed back through the house at Frank's heels.

The metal door slammed shut behind them of its own accord. Liza continued on, just part way up the alley before she felt safe. Her chest was heaving, breathing near hyperventilation, and she rested her back against the wall. Her fingers pressed tightly around her kneecaps as she bent over. The ground was cracked, covered in small rubble and dust and she fixed her wide eyes on this detail.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," she said several times, "I couldn't face her, she was so sure it was wrong, so sure."

 

[Sterling]

However liberal Frank Harper tried to imagine his reforged persona and outlook, his mind could not escape the reality that both he and Liza stood in a dangerous place. The vast majority of citizens who called the Dim Quarter home were mild and peaceful people, and it was those indocile elements —those perpetually dissatisfied customers, prone to the applied violence of communal misery— who gave Frank pause. Even as Frank swept behind Liza and wrapped his arm about her like a cloak of comfort, he knew ears had been piqued and eyes had set upon them. The eyes of Frank Harper turned sharp and swept the confines of their tunnel with predatory alertness; his voice breathed near Liza's ear in sympathetic confidence.

"Liza ... Liza! Listen to me. Don't apologize ... you haven't done anything wrong. What people are often varies markedly from who we want them to be. You can't control that."

In all honesty, Frank did not know what Liza had hoped to accomplish by the meeting. Was she expecting the mother to greet her with open arms, in a gesture of manifested authenticity. People and their pain go hand-in-hand, and Liza's mother must have buried whatever pain she bore from Liza's departure deep. That might have accounted for the vehemence in the woman's fervent rejection of Liza as a person; the deeper one dredges, the more silt clouds the water. The mother, however, with her meager, prole-like temperament and belligerence, was of no concern to the former OFFICER. Darkness came quickly to the steep canyons of stacked, subsidized housing crates, their crevices collecting the nightly filth of prowling gangs, the negative dawn of shattered dreams, and the scent of rat feces on cisterns dripping with polluted rainwater.

Even as Frank's arm draped with protective concern across Liza's shoulder, his predatory eyes sliced sharply into their surrounding and situation. Darkness came early to the impoverished Dim Quarter, the light failed to reach those deep crevices where humanity succumbed to desperation. Frank could sense those black walls beginning to close in about them, ever so slowly. The tirade from Bethany was thankfully brief, not only for Liza's sake, but also in drawing less attention to them. Frank knew Liza should not race back to the hover car, her heart might not be able to maintain the pace. Frank would defend Liza with his life, but he wanted to avoid such drastic drama; he and Liza were alone with no possibility of back-up. A careful, steady exfiltration would be best.

However, as Frank wrapped his hand around Liza's upper arm —his fingers tightening with the undeniable suggestion of urgency— a man walked into their end of the shadowed corridor. His head was down as he walked, the way one focused on the next step while hauling a burden. The man noticed Frank and Liza suddenly, stepping back to nowhere fruitful or safe. The pale light of the tiny intersection illuminated his light brown hair and blue eyes. Frank did not need the Prompter to recognize the similitude between the silhouetted forms between the man and Liza; Frank did not need to see the tiny monitor listing the identity of the man as one JOSEPH CARROLL. The armband he wore was dark crimson, stained deeply —to the point of ragged ruin— with the sweat from a life of toil toward an increasingly uncertain future. The look in the man's eyes was weary, it wasn't often that valued citizen made their way into the hovels of the Discarded. He could have shouted and had the gangs upon them in moments.

But, he didn't.

"Joseph Carroll?" Frank asked.

 

[Jess Incognito]

Liza reached out for Frank, fingers closing around a stretch of fabric near his waist, "Please don't, I - " She shook her head, ponytail falling over her head to stick on her sweaty cheek. She hadn't looked up at the man as he entered the alley and didn't look still as he spoke.

"What business have you got with me?"

Liza didn't move from her slumped position, pathetic though it may have looked. The more of herself she covered, the less vulnerable, the less she existed. She wished Frank hadn't asked. She was ready to leave it at angry words with some woman who didn't want her. Her eyes met Frank's. It couldn't be taken back.

"Have you ever lost a child, Mr. Carroll?" she spoke up after an extended silence.

The man took the smallest step back, as if physically affected by her question. He looked at the metal door of his home, only a few steps away, considering his options. "Once," he finally answered, "A long time ago."

"Your wife disagrees," she said quickly, stronger. Liza straightened herself, but did not disengage from the cool concrete.

"It...hurts 'er thinkin' about it," he said slowly, exacting his words with care.

"Because she was stolen?" Liza pushed, hopeful though her voice reflected the pessimism brought by recent defeat.

Joseph looked thoughtfully at this strange woman who knew something about him not many did. She was taking him to a place he hadn't planned on visiting today. "No," he said and Liza looked away again defeated, "Because she replaced 'er and knew it was wrong to do it."

"Replaced?"

He glanced upwards as if looking for the stars, but the alley walls sat so twisted, one unit upon another, that if he did see the sky, the darkness masked its borders. "You can't grieve your Anna if you still have one." Liza didn't understand. She stared at the man who might be her father without moving a muscle. Breath stuck in her throat, for all her energy funneled into understanding what Joseph was trying to say. "A second daughter," he continued as though obvious, sensing her disconnect, "With the same name, who she calls 'er first." In the beginning, friends and neighbors had seen this and thought it strange and tragic, but they let the grieving woman have it. Joseph let her have it. Twenty and so many years later, who was to say or remember differently?
She could not claim her name after all. She couldn't return to a life she missed. She was locked out and her place had been taken.

"Is my daughter alive?" he asked suddenly in the silence.

"Yes," Liza answered shortly after a moment. The darkness had thickened enough that Joseph Carroll wouldn't have been able to see the sadness in her eyes. He breathed a sigh of relief. None could know what happened to individuals disappearing in the Dim Quarter. Alive or dead, he never entertained the thought that he should know it officially. Liza didn't have the heart left that day to tell him how close he truly was.

He made a movement as if he'd heard something, but it must have been a sound only he was trained to notice. "It's too late for this. You should get out of this Quarter before the wrong sorts catch up." He stepped forward, closing the gap between himself and the metal door. His hand rested on the surface. His eyes were fixed to it in that moment before he looked back at them both, "What's her name now?"

"Eliza." He smiled briefly, perhaps repeating each syllable in his head to remember. She couldn't be Anna and he could never let her in properly if he finally met her, but mentally he made a new place for Eliza. "Thank you," he said, pushing into the small home and closing the door tight behind him.

Liza hung her head again. Given more time, she didn't know what she would have said. She chalked it up to his leaving to blame for keeping her identity secret. Truthfully, she hadn't the courage. She might have been afraid for him, even, her father. She wasn't welcome in this place or this life as far as she could tell. A pain much deeper than her own twisted through their memories.

She looked at Frank dismally. At the least, she had calmed down considerably. Her conversation with Joseph Carroll had been a strange one next to his wife's.

"I didn't have a plan for this," she admitted quietly, still not thinking about the warning of dangers in the darkness of the Dim Quarter.

 

[Sterling]

Danger would be gathering about them soon. The gangs of the Dim Quarter enforced their territorial sovereignty with extreme aggression, filtering through the warren-like architecture of the alleys and passages like white blood cells through veins. Frank and Liza were foreign, and represented an outside presence that impinged upon the only thing the residents of the Dim Quarter could cling to — their insularism. It was the only aspect of control they could believably exercise with any real demonstration of effect; the gangs did not take kindly to trespassers, who they viewed as insulting their most minimal of dignity.

Frank should have been worried about the coming dark, and would have been if he were not holding Liza in a comforting embrace. The gesture was unnatural, and he hesitated at first. But, the despondent look in Liza's eyes evoked a compassion Frank did not realize he possessed. Frank's strong hand gently rubbing the back of Liza's shoulder, and his comforting words came out as a coo.

"Liza," he whispered, "sometimes, there's ..."

Frank found himself not knowing what to say, the situation of solace a new and unfamiliar territory. He felt compelled to say something, and whispered.

"You've found what you've found. That's something. There's a difference between Free Choice and Free Will ... You took a step into the unknown, and that counts for something."

The scent of Liza's hair entered Frank's nostrils, and he thought it deeply affecting in its personal dimension, its uniqueness. Frank was rarely this close to a person, and his heart skipped a beat as he pulled back to look upon Liza's face and into her brown eyes. It was then that Frank realized he adored Liza, though he did not know what that meant. He could not stand to see her unhappy or in danger, and Frank's own heart pulsed rapidly as the reality of their situation began to dawn more clearly. Frank looked up at the sky, bright only by the fell shadows that seemed to collapse around them both like sheets of fractured glass. An insurmountable quality struck the former OFFICER, and his free hand produced his Prompter. The path back to the hover car was complicated, and the circuitous nature of their entrance would become a burden as they tried to exit the same route undetected.

Liza was watching Frank closely, their faces very near. "Liza," Frank said, quietly, "we need to move to safety ... now."

 

[Jess Incognito]

She did not cry, wound tight in the safety of Frank's arms. It would be grief for a thing she never knew. And still, she sensed emptiness. Motivation left her, evaporating with the last drops of sunlight in the valley. She couldn't claim any hopes for the future now and neither could she go back. There remained only one thread left to follow and she clung to it like a soaked child in the rain. It was the first real, solid contact with the man to whom she owed more than she'd ever owed anyone. Liza felt a strange consciousness, spreading her arms around him, fingertips pushing over the fabric of his jacket. It was a moment of realization that Frank was a man, warm but solid, feeling and reactive to her touch. It was the feeling of having seen a thousand faces in a lifetime and looking again to find the details had never been measured.

"You took a step into the unknown and that counts for something," he was saying quietly. She only hoped the step hadn't landed on thin air.

Liza didn't take her eyes from Frank as he scanned over his Prompter. Soft light washed over his features, the contrast telling her how truly dark it was becoming. Dusk had given way to night. She nodded at his words, faces so close she could feel his breath and the aura of warmth leaking from his skin. Urgency sank in, "Okay."

Half a moment more hung between them before Frank turned and led on. Liza jumped into step behind him, reaching for his hand before they came to the mouth of the alley. The warm and aged stain of concrete and blazing sun gave way to the blues of darkness. Shadows hung in every corner and if a soul dared stalk them, Liza didn't have the eyes to see them. The Dim Quarter was a different place by night than day.

They moved through the tight streets more swiftly now they were clear, but Liza had only Frank's device to trust in leading the way. She wished to be out of this place sooner, but they walked on with no more speed than a businessman with somewhere to be. She thought she heard things, she thought she saw darker spots than darkness itself. Goose pimples rose on her skin.

"Frank," she called as quietly as she could while being sure he would hear, "I - I think something is following us." Something because in the darkness, her fear had become greater than reason.

 

[Sterling]

The figures of Frank Harper and Eliza Abramson could be seen striding with purpose through the gaps in the rusted, vertical plate. A grim, mangled face watched them with increasing malice, a snarl never far from his ragged lips. The muscular man's head was shaven, though his whiskers had grown to a coarse stubble that marked how little he cared for glamor. The marketing of TELEstream would have had a field day with the deficiencies exuded by the gang leader, but alas, he was poor in funds and devoid of the vanity that drove the urge to compensate for abhorrent insecurity. Ledger only cared for one thing: his territory, and the sanctity of its borders. An infiltration had occurred, and an example needed to be made for the rest of the outside. He could see them; even in the darkness, Ledger could easily discern their appearance, the quality of their clothing and hygiene, their superior class.

The last ascription stung in the man's mouth with the full resentment of a hook catching his cheek. The presence of the outsiders was a clear transgression, one that would be atoned for with blood. Ledger watched the pair branch off into a deadend alley and moved silently in pursuit with machete in hand. He intended on keeping the promise he made and see both Frank and Liza dead within the hour.

........................................................​

Frank was sure they were headed the right way. He was absolutely certain, remembering various landmarks and consulting the Prompter's basic map function. Frank could feel Liza's hand in his own; if she was fearful, she hid it remarkably well. The darkness of early evening had firmly descended upon them, and their way was lit by random fires in oil barrels, beacons along alleys and residential hovels. The smell of the trashy fuel choked the thin air, and a brown haze —mist-like in its disorientation— spread out without thinning. The undiluted quality of the haze filled Frank with a quiet dread. Frank covered his face with the inside of his elbow as he pulled Liza through the refuse cloud until they branched off into an artery alley. Frank's Prompter made their path very clear—they would be in sight of the hover car within minutes of passing ...

Frank froze in disbelief. The way out was blocked by a massive, metal barrier mounted on wheels and enabled by a primitive pulley system. Frank rushed up to examine the obstacle, a stern, pensive look dominating his eyes. The barrier had been erected years prior, and had been purposefully been installed recently (hours ago?) to control traffic flowing in and out of the Dim Quarter. Frank could not help but feel that he and Liza were two flies having fallen into a cunning trap.

Frank palled when he heard the sound of metal scraping on metal, all about them. Hard men, numbering no less than ten, appeared from behind piles of scrap and emerged from the depths of shadows, surrounding them. Each of the gang members sported shaved heads, with facial hair of various states and lengths. Most openly wielded short, k-bar type knives, except for one. A taller man stepped forward ominously, carrying a jagged machete with eyes of undiluted murder. He did not speak, ask questions, or make demands. Frank began to back toward Liza, Prompter in one hand and his weapon in the other. Frank hazarded a quick glance at his Prompter, and after spotting a hanging, corrugated door, raised his weapon at the face of Ledger, the gang leader.

"Liza," Frank muttered under his breath, "on my mark, head through that metal door and don't stop until you reach the hover car." Frank stopped moving, standing firm as the other gang members began to encroach.

 

[Jess Incognito]

Liza turned around to face the way they had come as Frank examined the blockade. No human could possibly hear the breath of men more than twenty feet away or the sound of thick air ruffling in the wake of their steps, but Liza heard it now. At a standstill, her muscles tensed and the soles of her shoes fused to the dusty, cracked pavement. The Dim Quarter was completely silent, but she heard.

The sudden, jagged screech of metal made her body twinge, but still she didn't move. Not until their pursuers revealed themselves and with the instinct of a cornered mouse, she crept back as far as she could. Men seemed to peel themselves from the very cracks in the buildings, but chief among this gang slinked up straight before them. By the way he moved and held his head, she knew he was the man who decided what happens next.

She didn't take her eyes off him, not even as Frank spoke somewhere to the side of her. For a moment, she had forgotten she wasn't alone and was grateful for the familiar tones of his voice. She didn't look at his suggested escape route. One flick of her gaze and they would anticipate the move.

"I won't go unless you're right behind me," she whispered in reply. She had to know that it was his plan to follow. There was no next step without Frank. Even if she reached the hovercar, she wouldn't know where to go or where to even start. Just like before he found her, Liza would be left wandering the city and this time with no purpose at all.

 

[Sterling]

The odds favored those with nothing to lose. The idiom bounced around somewhere in Frank's steely skull as he stared down the grim, ominous gang leader. Frank stood at a stand-still, though there was room to retreat toward Liza. That was how Frank liked to engage—control the fight by controlling the front line, the line of action and operation. The relevant wisdom was clear to those few who still studied the art of warcraft; give your opponent what they expect, surprise them with what they do not. Liza was a vulnerable, young damsel with a man too stupid to know when he's being outnumbered and outmaneuvered. This was the theater Frank purported with his resolve, by creating a tension that might be dismissed, but could not be denied. If the gang leader, Ledger, knew the items Frank held in his hand, he might have thought twice about the butchery and blood in his heart. But, alas, such insular ignorance breeds a false courage when set against a former OFFICER with many upper hands at his disposal.

The internal dial on the Prompter ticked off the number targets in range. To the uninitiated, the white bar resembled an oddly proportioned bar of soap, though elongated and translucent. It contained no blade or ammunition, and was the least threatening device one could imagine. Once Frank's thumb dialed nine targets, he squeezed the lower portion, activating the internal trigger. Screams, muffled by the barrier of forcibly clenched teeth, tore across the courtyard as the gang members fell to their knees, clawing at the red-banks about their upper arms. Many convulsed and shook from the total, corporeal domination that comes with induced electrocution. Ledger lost his focus when the electrical discharge racked his body in bursts and fits, but the man fought through the pain, hefting his machete high. Ledger screamed low and crazed in determination, to pull himself past the shackles of agony. The discharged electrical potential within the armbands ruined the devices, but delivered enough charge to simultaneously nullify the use of most gross motor functions and incur a psychological deterrent.

Ledger's swing came high for power, but Frank dodged the swipe easily and replied with three blasts from his silenced weapon. Two explosive rounds opened visible cavities in the leader's chest, and the man fell to the ground dead. Frank, having the advantage, pressed it as hard as he dared. "Run!" he yelled behind him. Punching, thud sounds escaped Frank's weapon as three more adventurous thugs literally lost their heads in mists of blood and cranial matter. The Prompter found its home, stuffed inside Frank's TechJacket, as he twisted the barrel one-quarter rotation to the flechette setting. Frank had turned tail and pushed at the metal door until the rusty wheel upon which the door hung creaked in protest. Together, Frank and Liza opened the door just two feet, enough to slip inside. The effects of the pulse shock had worn off, and the surviving gang members ripped their armbands off and were charging toward the door. Frank waiting until Liza had traversed the length of the short corridor before firing his weapon. The explosion from the front of his barrel came as a thunderclap, and the front row of men fell quickly; each clutched their bodies, screaming, clawing at the pointed, steel projectiles embedded deeply within their chest and vital organs.

Frank pulled the door closed a foot, then turned calmly from the door and methodically reloaded his weapon by changing the barrel from a cache near his belt. His form was cloaked in blackness, but the former OFFICER could disassemble then reassemble his custom weapon in his sleep. Frank's eyes, now thin and vicious from hate, faced the doorway through the darkened corridor. A thin, vertical bar of light became Franks world as he raised his weapon in a two handed grip. The gang could have been circumventing his ploy, but he guessed there were not that bright, or determined. Then, almost on cue, Frank saw shadows through the corridor, dancing beyond the lit rectangle. The door opened quickly, and bald, muscular men sallied into the darkness towards Frank. He pumped more fletchette rounds into the corridor, into them not once, but twice, until the connective space became a horn broadcasting the death throes of Ledger's Baron Gang. Frank left the men to their fate, and ran in pursuit of Liza.

The street seemed frozen in deathly stillness after the violent clash, and the hovercar could be seen. Frank opened the gull wing doors remotely as he raced next to Liza. Weapon still in hand, Frank helped Liza inside the passenger side of the vehicle. Frank couldn't help but pay special attention to Liza's visage, her breathing, and her movements. He feared running and stress might exacerbate her heart condition, and he observed her closely. A stern eye was kept upon the Dim Quarter, in case a second wave of marauding thugs tested Frank's cunning as they made their escape.

 

[Jess Incognito]

Liza watched, frozen by the intense horror smeared on the men's faces. Her eyes darted from one to the next and found that each was afflicted by the same pain. Only when her eyes landed on Frank did she understand this was no strange phenomenon. One man alone furthered the press. His face split with deep ravines of pain and hatred. Liza felt the urge to step forward and pull Frank away from his deadly reach, but the exOFFICER was quicker and before she recognized the piercing sound of discharging rounds, the man lay dead.

The sound of Frank's voice pulled her back to icy clarity. He didn't look at her, but kept his eyes on the men still approaching. She stared blankly at the back of his head, but not long enough to be told twice. The hesitation left her reluctantly at the sight of three more men. Liza turned and pushed into the door Frank had indicated earlier. It's bottom grated over broken concrete and Liza had to give it a second shove before breaking through.

She resisted the urge to look back. Like Orpheus climbing from the depths of the Underworld, she feared turning her head would dissolve Frank in a murky oblivion. There were more shots then, but still she kept her eyes on the way ahead. Before too long the hovercar appeared. She spread her hand on the cool smoothness of the door, not knowing how to open it without Frank. The doors swung open, she soon realized not by her own hand. Frank materialized next to her and helped her down into the seat.

Her heart pounded wildly in her breast. In the fear, she hadn't noticed it before then. The interior of the hovercar blocked out all noise, all wind, and seemingly the night itself. They were safe, she though, safe. She sucked in air, doing her best to slow her breathing.

"I thought you weren't behind me," she admitted finally in the quiet. They sat still, both sets of eyes glued to the darkness they just escaped. Her breathing was still agitated and hyper, the smell of fear thick. The statement hung limp in the air. Liza lowered her head, raising her hand to her forehead. Her fingers threaded through her hairline, damp with sweat, and her palm held the weight of her head.

"I," she started faintly, still struggling to catch her breath. It was taking too long. The hour was late, her medication a long time behind her. With a sudden shock of panic, her fingers reached for the door, soon finding the correct latch. The door swung open and Liza leaned out. Leaning was as far as she got before what little she'd eaten that day splashed over the ground. Even emptied, her body lurched another time and once finished she sat still over the edge of the hovercar's seat. Her body shook with a weakness from the effort and her skin iced over.

She stared blankly at the dark earth, eyes wide. All thoughts had exited with her lunch.

 

[Sterling]

The restraint had not been secured across Frank's battle-tensed chest when the passenger door opened and Liza purged herself. Frank reached for the woman, fearing she might fall to the ground in a heap behind the flow of sick her stomach pumped not once, but twice. Frank turned to look back at the accursed corridor filled with gang corpses, half wondering if the dead might resurrect to pursue them in restless revenge. The passenger gull-wing door began to lower when Frank depressed a yellow switch on his door console. Frank clung to Liza's shoulder and neck with his hand. He wondered why his thin, frail-looking fingers possessed the strength they did, and he chalked up his indecision to the demands of duty. He gently pulled Liza back into her seat, and the dazed look in her eye would have normally betrayed a drug affliction. Frank roughly, and with several awkward movements, contorted his body and removed his TechJacket. The central drive-train housing that divided the pair dug into Frank's side as he leaned to lay his jacket over Liza, like a blanket already warm with his essence. Liza's face looked cold, pale, and colorless. Sweat had gathered near her brow-line.

Frank stared in pause. The saftey and well-being of Liza Abramson had become Frank's new religion, and in those rites he appeared to be failing his vows. He could not determine what ailed the young woman. The hovercar glided as smoothly as possible out of the Dim Quarter, driving for some minutes until he reached a complex of tenements not nearly so destitute. Frank piloted the hovercar to idle off the side of the lane, and he examined Liza with a greater degree of scrutiny, hoping to learn more. The man's gut clenched from an apprehension that he couldn't face, and dared not conceive.

"Liza ... please ... tell me what's wrong?"

..........................................
​

The lights of the sleek shuttle washed the private landing pad in pale yellow. The hissing of the hydraulics ebbed along with the diminishing whine of the anti-gravity turbines. A man walked slowly down a stepped gangway from the vehicle's mid-section and across a bridge to his home. He had walked this route every day for the past six years, and the regularity granted him comfort. Days plagued by rain were especially tedious, but he walked the bridge just the same. A dwelling with bright lights beckoned him at the end of the metal pathway. Below the cantilevered walking surface roared the ubiety of intense air traffic, and a light wind from their turbulence puffed the man's coiffed hair.

Lors Dema was late for his wife's party. He was always late, but it never bothered his wife. Dorea tolerated his incessant tardiness since her parties occurred every week with the mechanical frequency of atomic clockwork. The OFFICER approached the foyer and passed the garden of artificial boxwood shrubs, arranged in perfect, geometric fashion. The door lifted fluidly at his approach, and he entered the noisy dwelling without breaking stride. Inside stood a stiff crowd gathered about tapered, white pedestals, upon which were translucent, waffled domes. The OFFICER moved through the throng hoping to pass unnoticed, but a frail man caught his upper arm. He smelled of distilled oranges and soap, smiling with a tight grin as fake as his bright green hair color.

"Ah, Lors! So good to see you, Lad. Mind if I share something?" The older man pressed one of the waffles, which depressed a section of the dome. A holo-projection sprung to life, the transparent image of a bright red aero-yacht with a dining lounge and dancing floor. The mind-boggling cost scrolled along the bottom, along with the craft's specifications and luxury upgrades. "This beauty should be mine next month. First stop will be the Pyrenes Resort! Would you and Dorea care to join us?"

Lors returned a stale, insipid smile. "I'm dreadfully busy, Hestus. But, congratulations on your … acquisition. It's handsome."

Hestus beamed in self-inflation, soon stifling it to snare another hapless woman who happened to be passing by. "Excuse me, dear. May I show you something?"

The OFFICER walked from the party with a scowl and sick feeling in his stomach. Lors had come home to search for his wife, and soon found her abuzz with extroverted energy, orbited by several finely-dressed socialites. Dorea's eyes lit with excitement at the sight of her husband, and she abandoned the entourage that swarmed about her. Her heels clicked as she wrapped her arms around the neck of her man. She kissed him upon the lips, and her eyes widened as he returned her affection with a neediness.

"Lors," she asked with a bemused smile. "Are you alright?"

The OFFICER's look became desultory, finally resting upon his wife's eyes. "Can we talk in the bedroom?"

Dorea hooked her lithe arm about his muscular one, and pulled him through a series of mini-foyers. They arrived in an austere room, adorned with bright paintings and whimsical sculptures. A stranger might have found the decorative aspect in opposition to the stark lines and materials that composed the room's foundation. Yet, these emblems of vitality had remained in place for years, uncontested, if only shifted to alternate locations by the OFFICER's fussy standards against his wife's sense of décor.

Lors held Dorea in another tight hug, one that left the woman wide-eyed and gripping his back fiercely in concern. Her breathing began to quicken in fear. "Sweetheart?" Lors pulled back, hiding his hand as it cleaned his face of the tear that shamed him. He strode to the balcony and stood in the cool, evening air. Dorea approached Lors slowly, her white, silken dress flowing behind her from the outside wind. She placed her hand upon her husband's shoulder, holding her breath.

"Dorea … You've been giving to the poor again, haven't you?"

The woman exhaled in relief. "This again?" Her tone adopted the light and playful demeanor of a woman with a good-heart, born into a life without consequence. "I suppose." Her fingers draped across Lors' chest, unbuttoning the top and steadily moving downward. "We have so much … what's the harm in helping those get on their feet?" Lors had heard these musings before, and the heretical resonance made his brain ache. His eyes rolled back as Dorea's nails began to graze the region between Lors' legs until his hardness left him breathless. Dorea looked back where they came. "No one would hear us, dear. You could have your way with me … the way you always do."

Lors spun quickly behind her, mouth kissing her neck and his hands squeezing her breast through her thin dress. Dorea bit her lips against the surge of pleasure coursing through her body, an excitation that escalated when Lors's hand slid up her chest to firmly grasp her neck. Dorea tried to catch her breath, leaning forward to awkwardly grasp the meager guardrail surrounding the balcony. Lor spoke in the tone Dorea wanted, desired to hear. His words came on warm breath. "Lift your dress for me." Dorea's hand was feeling the texture of Lors' hair behind her, and dropped her hands to raise the hem of the dress like the lifting of a theater curtain. Lors brought his hand up the inside of her leg. Dorea was transcendent in anticipation for the pleasure that she thought would soon come.

She was to be terminally disappointed.

Lors released the hand from her throat and grapsed the back of her scalp roughly, and the hand between her legs---instead of gently summoning her erotic bliss---hooked the bottom of her pelvis and hoisted her over the guardrail. Her fingers tried to grab onto that meager barrier, but fell to silence along with terrified screams. The bottom of Dorea's fall would be a subterranean maintenance pit some twenty-six stories below street level. If Lors calmly walked back to his shuttle through that infernal party, her plummet would meet its messy conclusion the moment he reached in the operator's seat. Falling in abject terror was a horrid death, but a cleaner one than sending a silenced bullet through her skull. No blood, no screaming, no pleading. Lors knew he'd relent when he looked into her vulnerable eyes. Mercy was unacceptable.

<<You did what you had to do.>>

The voice sounded like a shallow whisper, supremely powerful from a detached realm of covert power, like the urging words of the Devil in a dream. The consolation came unbidden from somewhere behind him. Lors didn't move, but peered down wondering if the white speck in the deep distance was Dorea or an errant guidance light.

<<Her heresy would have spread to very influential members of society. What you did was brave. What you did was for the best.>>

"You told me I'd be happy this time."

<<You were … for a time.>>

"I was until you told me of her heresy this morning."

<<Is happiness what you really want, Lors?>>

"Isn't it what everyone wants?"

<<But, you're not everyone … are you? There's a saying that the candle that burns twice as bright burns half as long. It's been a terrible series of coincidence that your wives have succumbed to the sins of truancy and heretical doctrine. How a man like you can persevere is beyond my understanding. These episodes will continue so long as divergence and heresy plague our glorious society. I'm glad we are partners against this … disease, and I promise we shall double our efforts to eradicate it.>>

The hissing called with a seductive temptation. Lors still gazed into the near infinite depth from the tower balcony, silent.

<<Lors … I think, perhaps, you should consider another wife in the near future … but, I have a task for you now. One of the highest priority.>>

Lors swallowed hard, then turned stone faced, ready to do as he was bid.

 

[Jess Incognito]

Frank's fingers burned icy cold against the flush of her neck. It combatted the lingering nausea. He spread his jacket over her back and slowly during the short drive she pulled it closer around her body. Liza said nothing to ease his apparent worry; she'd not yet eased her own. In the time it took to put distance between themselves and the Dim Quarter, her body ceased shaking and the chill seeped away.

She stared at her fingers peeping from the folds of Frank's jacket.

"It's just shock," she offered finally in answer. She felt vaguely that this was not the truth, but it was all that made sense. Liza wasn't afraid to watch a man die. She wouldn't have known this yesterday, but now that she had experienced it, she felt nothing but relief. She raised her face to look at him, eyes revealing the shame she held for her sickness. Frank showed no sign of disgust. Instead there was only the strong blaze of compassion and concern. No one had ever been so worried about her. Not in such a way that made her feel that her pain hurt him, too.

"It's gone now. I'm fine."

Her left hand, she realized, hovered next to his cheek. She stretched her fingers and let the tips land on his skin, barely touching the fuzz of hair. They jumped out of the sea of TELEstream together, for better or worse. Frank's history was a mystery to her. What he left behind, however much or little, like hers could not be retrieved. The security of conformity was beyond them now. In him she couldn't see whether he thought about this with any great pain or not. There was no plan, but it seemed they still had some time ahead of them.

She closed her fingers over her palm and pulled back, conscious of the sting of bile in the back of her throat.

 

[Sterling]

The answer Liza gave Frank assuaged his surprisingly fierce concern. He may not have appeared fervent, but Frank held down his own nausea at the thought of Liz being affected in any way negative. The color had seeped back into Liza's features and Frank found himself breathing easier. She watched him, he noticed. Not merely to observe his actions and gain some juvenile sense of security, but saw into Frank with a gaze that was soft and open—she emanated tenderness, despite her bout of puking. Liza's hands lightly raked the hair near his ear, and Frank closed his eyes. He found his head leaning into Liza's touch, and his breathing bated.

A reality greater than a feeling —more properly described as a compelling urge— swelled inside Frank. He wanted nothing more than to grasp Liza's lithe digits in his and kiss them with an unfamiliar tenderness. When Liza retracted her hand, Frank awoke as if from a dream. And, the starkness of their morning crashed about Frank Harper.

The blissful surreality of Luza's touch gave way to the starkness of their situation. Frank was forced to admit that, not only did he not have a plan, but that TELEstream could guess their location with relative ease. The destruction of arm bands, whether from the aristocratic to the indigent, was neurotically monitored by the specteral AI. In addition, the induction signature that caused the multiple devices to fail would inform TELEstream that Frank's Prompter was the culprit.

However, the most impinging aspect of their situation came in the form of tiny, pink pills. Frank had been all too aware that Liza's supply of heart medicine must be thinning. He hated acting out of desperation, but they had thrown themselves into desperate straits. Afterwards, Frank told himself assuringly. After we find her medicine, we'll search for The Haven.

The hover around accelerated through the standing tenements and found a high-speed isolation track, rocketing down the straightaway at noisy wrong speed. Frank had not spoken to Liza since starting, pouring the entirety of his concentration to driving forward toward their next goal. "We're headed to retrieve you more heart medicine, Liza," Frank said. He turned fir a moment, a lightsome smile breaking his usually grim visage. "Wholesale shopping ... at the factory."

 

[Jess Incognito]

Like magnets split apart and tossed across a room - Frank and Liza seeped back into their own seats, surrounded again by individual thoughts and silence. She stared passively at the shapes whizzing by, mostly darkness now with the occasional speck of incandescence.

Liza blinked, not comprehending the sudden words which pulled her from the cozy water of thought with cold hands. Wholesale shopping...it sounded a bit like stealing. Her immediate response was a mix of fear and apprehension, but she quickly realized theft was not worse than the crimes they had already committed against TELEstream. Still, through all of this she realized more and more how unprepared for this leap she was. Who was she now? Runaway. Dissenter. Thief. And for what?

Her life. They were stealing her life, or rather, taking it back. What Frank proposed put her life back in her own hands and maybe they were getting Frank's as well. No matter how one drew the lines, she couldn't figure how life could be made criminal.

Liza nodded slowly, "Okay," and tilted her head towards Frank, "I'm with you."

They soon drove into the yard of an imposing building, squatting over a concrete plot between ruddy buildings. It was without design and almost windowless. The light here cast a ruddy, yellow glare on every outcrop and she should have been glad of it, except for the deep shadows growing from the corners. A thick breeze whistled through the narrow streets, carrying on it the scent of metal and grime. It seemed to her that they could find themselves in a bad situation at any moment. Like in the Dim Quarter, anyone could come from any angle and they wouldn't in the maze of industrial houses, see it coming. Of course, there shouldn't be anyone in the Industrial Sector at such a time.

She cast her gaze sideways, looking for any emotion in Frank. She couldn't tell if he was apprehensive or calm.

 

[Sterling]

The inconspicuous nature of the Industrial Center disguised its latent identity to all but the initiated. In Frank's case, the once initiated, former-OFFICER knew precisely what the complex held and what building to infiltrate. One of the duties of Junior OFFICERS entailed responding to seismic alarms within the manufacturing facility. The incursions happened with sporadic, but regular frequency, and consisted of frustrated indigents procuring goods without having earned the proper credits. When younger, Frank found such activity criminal, and would have palled at the though of what he was about to do.

The darkness was total in those neglected pockets, rendering the milieu in an abject starkness. Frank's finger flicked a switch on the console, and the windshield paled in a faint rush to change the of hue of its presentation. What was shadow appeared in warm, white relief, and in startling detail. Pilzar illumination technology was standard issue for every OFFICER, and mesmerized those unaccustomed to how beautifully its tone brought night conditions to light without a bite of glare.

Frank hid his fear well enough, though a scowl leaked through his stolid visage as he spotted a hidden place to park. The scurrying movements of several rats caught Frank's sharp eye as he steered the hovercar into the alcove of an already recessed courtyard. The alcove surrounding the hovercar was solid permacrete on all sides, save for an egress, clearly on Liza's right. The passage led to the unknown, but it led somewhere; the cold smack of night air greeted Frank as he exited the car to the trunk.

Once the trunk door lifted high, Frank removed his long TechJacket and folded it near the bumper. The frenetic ease with which he reloaded his weapon cylinders betrayed the reality that acquiring Liza's heart medication would not be the stroll he implied. Real danger lurked inside, and Frank expected a fight when they returned to the surface. The control building, however massive, was like the tip of a colossal manufacturing iceberg that plunged many levels beneath the surface. At the bottom-most level, the power capacitor discharged enough heat to make traversing the level impossible without specialized suits. Luckily, their path was easier and did not require descending into the heathen's Inferno.

Leaving Liza in the hover car had crossed Frank's mind. That would have been the safest place at the moment, though the constitution of 'safe place' seemed to shift under their feet, like so much sand. Every one of their adventures —every encounter with the world of TELEstream— brought them one step closer to being discovered by the execrable AI, which manically sought with diabolical intensity. This particular adventure would surely paint their location with unerring precision. It was the beginning of the end for Frank Harper, but the end of the beginning for Liza Abramson; she had a future, while his time was quickly running out.

Frank emptied the contents of his trunk onto his person, not certain if the hovercar would be a means of departure. Liza's limited mobility factored greatly in Frank's planning, their route, and hopeful escape. Frank could lose the hovercar, but would never lose Liza until he could release her. He wondered what his face betrayed in the dim when Liza decided to join him.

 

[Jess Incognito]

Liza scanned their surroundings, which extended only a short ways on all sides of the vehicle before hitting concrete walls in every direction save one. She stared down the passage to her right, relieved in a way to have only a single path forward after the maze that was the Dim Quarter. It was a false sense of security.

She remained in her seat while Frank went through the trunk. Her hand went to the pocket of her jacket, feeling the smooth plastic of the medication bottle. Her breathing was normal and the nausea had not returned, but she turned the bottle in her fingers once, twice.Without this, she thought, afraid even to continue thinking on this track. Without this she was no one, because sooner or later without it, she was dead. Liza wanted to be free of everything. She didn't know even half the true nature of TELEstream, but she feared it still. Life would be simpler and better without, she truly believed, but it wasn't possible. To turn and go, it should have been simple.

The vehicle shuddered when the trunk was shut. She pulled the bottle from her pocket, unscrewed the lid and took the last pill without looking at it. She stepped out and made her way around the hovercar then. Despite his joking on the way, he looked less than ready. She was sure she looked worse. She feared this.

A light breeze funneled into the alcove, pulling at her hair and sinking through the fibers of her jacket. The darkness was cold.

"Frank," she started, we don't have to do this, you don't have to do this. They could just go - somewhere where she could take it easy and her heart wasn't a problem. All this running and dodging, maybe it was only making it worse. Death's dusty shadow loomed over her thoughts and tendrils of dark fingers stretched down all the walls around them. Frank had implicated himself in so much already; she could go alone, but her fear sank deeper at the thought of it. Doubt hung over his face, too, and a guilt for not saying those first words tore at her insides, winding a snag of nerves around its damage and aching worse than the chest pains. Liza had to make up her mind. Her features shifted into resolution, voice as strong as she could manage, "What's the plan?"